A soft thump echoed through Al’Corvo’s silent apartment. Having just climbed up to his door, Al’Corvo was completely exhausted. While normally the trek would’ve perhaps left him slightly winded, his inability to climb up the various ladders and walls smoothly exerted him more than he cared to admit. Just because it was theoretically possible for someone to permanently lose an arm (even with ectoplasm treatments), it didn’t mean that Raqmu had any disability access.

Once again, instead of cleaning up the various dishes and music cartridges, Al’Corvo jumped onto a hammock that he used instead of a bed. A hammock, according to Al’Corvo, was the ultimate form of sleep-facilitating furniture. For one, it was cheap, and for two, it took up relatively little space as it hovered about 1 metre off the ground. 1 whole metre of space that could be used to store various bits and pieces.

Almost the instant he landed, Al’Corvo dropped the pills and papers onto a small shelf underneath his hammock, before pulling up the blanket piled at the foot of the hammock to cover his weary body. Of course, story snatcher’s didn’t strictly feel the cold as they were mostly poikilothermic. If exposed to particularly cold temperatures, their metabolism simply slowed down before finally falling into a hibernation state. Instead, the blanket simulated the cramped and warm conditions the story snatchers originally came from.

Once fully covered but for the head, Al’Corvo lazily dangled an arm downwards and grabbed the hallucinogenic pill. He quickly consumed it, before settling down into a resting position.

In but a few minutes Al’Corvo felt something akin to eels slithering up his leg. Not that he had ever seen or felt an eel, but something told him that that’s what it felt like. Peeking underneath the covers, he saw nothing there. The sensation stopped. Then, he heard whispers in his left ear-hole. What they were saying, he couldn’t guess. When he payed attention to the whispers, he saw technicolour hands, almost like oil stains, crawl up his vision. The walls themselves began warping, with dozens of hands reaching out to grab Al’Corvo.

Al’Corvo found himself standing upright, gazing at an endless expanse of ruined buildings and red trees. In the distance he saw a tower that reached into the heavens, it looked as though it was made of dozens of other skyscrapers, meshed together by some unknown force. Surrounding it were barely-visible walls made of what appeared to be some sort of sandstone-like material.

“My home. Is it not grand? It was restored not too long ago. Just as the centurions came to roost.” Al’Corvo heard an almost wistful voice coming from behind him.

Al’Corvo turned to see another story snatcher, although there were a few things that were clearly wrong. Firstly, their body was almost a translucent greenish-blue that shimmered like an aurora. Secondly, their hind-arms were bound by tight metal restraints. The figure almost looked familiar, but Al’Corvo couldn’t place where he had seen this person before.

The story snatcher turned to face him.

“You have killed me, although it is not the first time I have died. Now you too will fall, and I will rise anew. Such is our fate, to rise again and again, seeking that which we cannot have.” The story snatcher looked unsympathetically at Al’Corvo, although there was still a hint of pain in his eyes.

“You mean to possess me?” Al’Corvo spoke in a dull monotone, the emotion having apparently disappeared entirely from his body.

“Yes. I am the one who is real. You shall be the one who is unreal. You will become Me, as did the body before you.”

“False. Total reality levels > 30%. Designation: Al’Corvo has a total reality level of ≥ 70%. You cannot be more real than Al’Corvo.”

Al’Corvo turned again to see who spoke, only to see himself. Although, unlike Al’Corvo the reflection was made from rough polyhedrons and polygons, without a single curve on its entire body.

“Who are you?” Al’Corvo looked and felt half awake at this point, he felt his rational thought leave him as the logic of dreams flooded into his mind.

“I am the you that is referred to as Logos.” Logos, as it called itself, spoke in a pure monotone.

“Your mind fights back, but surely it doesn’t need to? Your arm is gone, you are useless. Surely it would be better off dying?”

Al’Corvo took a step back, barely aware that he was moving, before a chessboard appeared where he was but a moment ago. Two chairs manifested soon afterwards, causing ripples in the silken sand beneath Al’Corvo’s feet. When exactly the concrete turned to sand, Al’Corvo wasn’t sure.

Logos took a seat on the black side, before moving a pawn. As he did so, he spoke once more.

“The arm has not sustained major damage. Removed does not equal lost permanently. If you believe Al’Corvo will be rendered useless, or otherwise unable to perform his duties, you are incorrect.”

As he spoke, the pieces seemed to move on their own, skipping forward and warping into place instantaneously. The ghost, or Me, as Al’Corvo began thinking of it as, was losing.

“Perhaps. But of course what if the arm never moves again? His brain will have sealed this memory off, it will never even remember losing an arm. He will be left crippled.”

The white pieces suddenly moved more strategically, taking Logos’ pieces precisely and without hesitation. Logos simply stared with polygonal eyes, taking in the board as though it was a book, reading every move and thinking about his next action. Logos then turned to Al’Corvo before speaking again.

“Yet he is here again. This would be impossible if he never remembered this encounter. Your logic is flawed.”

The black pieces moved again, driving the white side into check again and again, moving ever closer to checkmate. Al’Corvo couldn’t be sure if the drugs were altering his memory, or if he was somehow sent back to the original possession attempt.

“Both, not-Me. Reality is distorted by our kind, it breaks and frays with ease. The doors of the underworld have swung open because of this fact. Time becomes irrelevant as quickly as space after all.” Me stated simply, although the strained look on its face spoke to the amount of effort it took to protect against Logos’ advances. Looking back, Al’Corvo could even see his reattached arm.

“You have lost. I detect a minor decrease in your reality levels.” Logos spoke with surety.

“Hmmm. This is a tricky position,” Me deliberated as to which piece he would move, before finally settling on moving his final bishop. “However, there is also the fact that you would no longer be able to fulfill your contract yes? If you are crippled, you will no longer be able to work for the state. You will become-”

Me was cut off by Logos.

“You are now appealing to Al’Corvo’s emotional state. You have acknowledged that on a logical level, you cannot make a proper argument for why Al’Corvo must die. Checkmate.” As he said that, Logos moved his rook, causing a checkmate. The board disappeared.

“You refuse to acknowledge my point, my dear Logos. Perhaps because you know I am right?” A smug smile formed on Me’s face as he talked.

“You’re wrong!” Al’Corvo heard a passionate voice yell out, one that was oddly familiar. As he looked upon the new arrival, he determined that it was familiar because he was looking at himself. Seemingly the direct opposite of Logos, this version of Al’Corvo didn’t have a single straight line on his body. It gave this newcomer an almost fluid look, like they were made of pastel-blue water rather than flesh and chitin.

“And who are you?” Al’Corvo almost felt a rhythm arise from within him. Like everything in this world of dreams had rules that tightly bound him to the point that he didn’t even need to think about them. The appropriate rule simply appeared in his mind when he needed it. One of the first rules was to always question new arrivals, lest they be something uninvited.

“I am the you that is known as Pathos,” unlike Logos, Pathos introduced himself with a flourish.

“A new challenger? Of the five bodies I have possessed, most fall to their feelings of uselessness. You must have a strong will to defeat me with Logos. Of course, that doesn’t change your predicament. I will become real once more. I will become real!” As it said the last sentence, Me gained a rabid look in its eyes.

Instead of a game, Pathos manifested a sword made of glass, while Me simply made two daggers out of sand. Al’Corvo understood that in a battle of emotions, it was not suitable to play a game, it was only acceptable to fight.

Pathos lunged, and Al’Corvo felt boiling sand spray across his shell. Me responded in kind with the twin daggers, both curved impractically. Yet it wielded them with the sort of skill gained only with years of practice and various life-or-death situations.

“You cannot win Pathos! For it was in the gladiatorial pits of Remus that I fought, and with these daggers I won!”

Pathos merely strained his face with the effort of the fight, as Me had the clear advantage. Of course, the fight wasn’t fought with skill, but emotion. Al’Corvo knew that Remus had fallen millennia ago, so Me had thousands of years to build up its emotions.

“But then you lost yes? You fell when your arms were bound, when you were at the height of your career no?” With a sudden parry of Me’s blows, Pathos performed a perfect riposte that forced Me into the defensive.

“At least I died doing what I loved! Instead, Al’Corvo, you will fall having failed your only duty. You could never be a merchant, nor could you do any labour as no one would accept you with a crippled arm. You are worthless, would it not be better to die here than face your failure alive?” Me was once again smug in the knowledge that it had Al’Corvo in the place that hurt the deepest.

Pathos staggered back, suddenly surprised by a feint that transitioned into a biting blow. Al’Corvo was not a man who was fueled by emotions. He didn’t have anything else to draw on other than his will to survive. Even that seemed to drain at the ghost’s words.

Al’Corvo watched as Pathos’ glass sword shattered against Me’s daggers. Before Me could deliver the finishing blow, Al’Corvo stepped forward.

“You are forgetting one thing ghost. I have a new role in this tale, for I will hunt you and your kin. The terms of my contract may be re-written, for unlike the great walls of Babylon they are not of stone.” Al’Corvo held in his hands a Ward man-catcher, and he plunged the mace into Me’s chest.

“Now return to the land of the dead, fade into obscurity once more like the rest of your kind.” With that, Me began crumbling into shards of metal. Looking around, Al’Corvo noticed that but a few metres away was another Al’Corvo, only he was still missing his arm.

“Seraphs above, will I become a pretentious prick in the future?” The other Al’Corvo almost looked concerned.

“Not really, I’m only a few days older than you. For some reason this whole dream thing forces you to say words in a certain way.” Al’Corvo smiled at the thought of potentially talking to his actual past-self.

“No problem, I get that. I think you’re about to wake up now. Good luck with the Wards by the way. Will I remember this?”

“I don’t think so. At least until you take some drugs given to you by the hospital.”

Al’Corvo suddenly woke up.